About

Oregon Green Energy Guide

This green energy resource guide is an attempt to aggregate and survey information on sustainable energy in Portland and Oregon.

Preface

This report is the personal project of the author, Sam Churchill, who has no particular expertise in this field. The motivation is simply to create an overview of trends and developments in sustainable energy as they relate to Portland and Oregon. No compensation of any type was involved. I generally support the goals of sustainability, although I’ve attempted to minimize any point of view here.

Utility-scale, alternative power in Oregon and Portland, solar and wind energy providers, and green building leadership in Portland are overviewed here, but many smaller “green” or sustainable-focused firms have not been listed or described.

I’ve added newer sections on oil, gas and coal trains traveling through the Columbia Gorge. Those sections have become a sprawling, disorganized mess. I intend to prune them down and make them more readable, soon.

The report finds that by 2025, the global average cost of electricity from solar PV and onshore wind will be around five to six cents per kilowatt hour. The implication is clear: coal, oil and natural gas won’t be cost/competitive for long…at least where there is plenty of sun and wind.

Electricity generation (from coal) and transportation (using gas and oil) are the largest sources of green house gases (primarily CO2). In the United States, electricity generation accounts for nearly 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, the largest of any source.

The Levelised Cost of Energy for coal-fired generation increased from $66 per MWh to $75 in the Americas, from $68 to $73 in Asia-Pacific, and from $82 to $105 in Europe. The global average cost of onshore wind power has dipped to $83 per megawatt-hour, while solar power now costs $122.

For generating electricity in the US, coal and gas are still cheaper, at $65 per MWh, against wind at $80 and PV at $107. The transportation industry is currently driven by fossil fuels but cheaper, longer range electric vehicles will have a significant impact over the next 20 years, according to many projections.

Electric generation from solar and wind cuts emissions dramatically … and the energy source is “free”. Electric vehicles reduce oil consumption. Conservation measures (such as converting to LED lighting) also save energy (and money). Whether these measures will be enough to prevent big social/economic problems in the future is still not certain.

Renewables would bring some energy revenue back to Oregon. PacifCorp, which gets about two thirds of its power supply from coal-fired power plants outside of Oregon, has pledged to shut 10 coal units by 2030 or convert them to run on natural gas. PGE’s Boardman facility is the only coal-fired power plant in Oregon, but PGE also buys coal-powered electricity from out of state.

Skeptics

Skeptics of renewable energy investments say the government should not be in the business of making bets. They site examples like Solyndra, which went bust soon after the federal government pumped more than $500 million into the solar start-up.

Critics may have a point. SoloPower, a solar energy startup that received millions in incentives to open a Portland manufacturing plant, is suspending operations in North Portland by the summer of 2013, barely a year since it commenced operations.

Economic Rationale

Green energy advocates say Oregon has what it takes; the silicon processing expertise, the wind, the waves, and a massive regional power distribution network. It’s a natural fit.

Electricity is a strong focus of sustainability efforts because it is cleaner and more sustainable than burning fossil fuels. Moving from coal-powered electric power generating plants to solar and wind-powered alternatives is one thrust. Moving cars to electricity or alternative fuels like ethanol using corn or wood fiber is another thrust. A third thrust, of course, is conservation.

These initiatives, it is argued, can be justified on both economic and environmental grounds, and constitute sound policy.

The average U.S. household uses about 10,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity each year, reports Sustainable Business Oregon. Photovoltaics and wind turbines, installed on residences or businesses can generate as much as 20-30% of the average daily demand. A typical residential solar array is 3-5 KW, while the average residential and small business wind projects are about 10 KW in size. Solar, of course, only works while the sun shines and wind turbines are dependent on wind.

It’s a tough sell without tax incentives and kickbacks. Oregon has some of the cheapest electric rates in the nation.

Green development, which includes both green building technologies and energy-efficiency retrofits.

Electric vehicles and the associated sectors, which includes energy storage.

For clean energy, the region’s big players, are SolarWorld and Vestas. For green development, the PDC will continue to promote the building of the Oregon Sustainability Center, and for the electric vehicles, PDC will work with Drive Oregon and development-focused businesses such as Swiss battery technology company ReVolt.

Research firm Clean Edge surveyed more than 3,500 data points and 70 major indicators drawing from both municipal and private data sources to evaluate all 50 states in the U.S. for how well they did on policy, technology, and capital when it came to green tech. Oregon came in second, after California.

Ron Pernick, founder of Clean Edge, literally wrote the book — The Clean Tech Revolution a 2007 book that proclaimed that commercializing clean technologies is a profitable enterprise. He highlighted eight major clean technology sectors: solar power, wind power, biofuels, green buildings, personal transportation, the smart grid, mobile applications, and water filtration.

Green businesses, say proponents, benefit Oregonians by bringing jobs and money here. The jury may still be out on longer term results, but it’s undeniable that a large number of solar, wind and wave businesses, as well as related “green industries” have recently moved into Oregon and Portland.

World energy consumption keeps going up, according to BP. Renewables accounted for 2.7% of global consumption in 2013, up from 0.8% a decade ago. But coal accounted for 30.1% of total primary energy consumption, the highest proportion since 1970, suggesting a prioritization of cheap rather than clean sources of energy.

“The world has agreed that we have to keep climate change within two degrees centigrade.

And we have five times as much fuel as we need to do that right at our fingertips, proven reserves. We used to think, years ago, that we were going to run out of fossil fuel; we’re going to run just about the time that we really need to get off it for climate reasons.

But that’s not going to happen; we’re not going to run out.

The economy is not going to solve this problem for us. It’s not going to price fossil fuel out of the market. We are going to have to decide where, when, and how we’re going to stop burning this fuel.”

In 2011 the global economy emitted 32.6 billion metric tons of carbon pollution, reports the NY Times. The United States was responsible for 5.5 billion tons of that (coming in second to China, which emitted 8.7 billion tons). Within the United States, electric power plants produced 2.8 billion tons of those greenhouse gases, while vehicle tailpipe emissions from burning gasoline produced 1.9 billion tons.

Coal-fired power plants and fossil fuel are the biggest contributors to global warming. Global warming is caused by releasing what are called greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The most common greenhouse gas is carbon dioxide.

350 parts per million is what many scientists, climate experts, and progressive national governments are now saying is the safe upper limit for CO2 in our atmosphere. The current level is over 400 parts per million and headed towards 450 ppm in 5-10 years. 350 PPM is supposedly the number humanity needs to get back to as soon as possible to avoid runaway climate change.

According to the US government’s 2013 Energy Infrastructure Update (pdf), renewable energy sources (i.e., biomass, geothermal, hydropower, solar, wind) have accounted for more than a third of all new electrical generating capacity in 2013.